


you cannot unlearn the feeling

by wafflelate



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulbonds, Everyone Needs A Hug, Gen, Loneliness, Soulbond Forms During Moments of Extreme Empathy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-26
Updated: 2020-04-26
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:08:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23685175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wafflelate/pseuds/wafflelate
Summary: He has the scroll. Mizuki is being worse than ever. Iruka is hurt and everything is terrible and Mizuki asks, "Don't you want to know why you could never bond with anyone? Why it'simpossiblefor you?"
Relationships: Gaara & Uzumaki Naruto
Comments: 9
Kudos: 182
Collections: What Fen Do (Instead of Going Outside), When Death Loves Flamingos





	you cannot unlearn the feeling

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Masu_Trout](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Masu_Trout/gifts).



> I read your exchange letter for that soulmate exchange and become instantly obsessed because this idea has been kicking around in the back of mind mind for ages and your letter just....highlighted all the important parts and made it really easy to write. It's not as shippy as I wanted it to be, but hopefully you will still enjoy it!

When you feel the same you're supposed to connect, that's what Naruto's heard. Iruka's talked about it sometimes — he's said stuff like, "In times of heightened emotion blah blah blah comrades blah blah bah Will of Fire," you know? — and Naruto _listened_ , he really did, but he didn't get it. He thought it was just a way of talking. 

Who would want to consider they were missing something so fundamental? 

But then Naruto is in the forest. He has the scroll. Mizuki is being worse than ever. Iruka is hurt and everything is terrible and Mizuki asks, "Don't you want to know why you could never bond with anyone? Why it's _impossible_ for you?" 

He says 

that Naruto is a monster 

that monsters 

that they don't 

that they _can't_

and Iruka says, "Naruto," and looks so sad. And Iruka says, "It's okay," and it _isn't_. Iruka puts a hand on his shoulder and explains: Naruto is not what Mizuki said he is, but the practice bonds the other kids have been making all their lives are impossible for a jinchūriki. Too much chakra, pressed too close, tied up in complex knots to keep in something that should be out. How could there be space for anything else? 

Naruto feels things. He feels a _lot_ of things. He isn't — at school they talk about battle fatigue turning people _off_ , so they just don't feel anything at all, and Naruto isn't _like that_. He's like everyone else! 

Except for that he isn't. 

It had been in lectures because when you want to protect your teammates — and they want to protect you — when you all _focus_ , it becomes something _more_. Not as deep as a soulbond, and not permanent, but useful. Powerful. Important. 

Naruto's team will never have that. He thinks about it when they're trying to get the bells, and he thinks about it when they're fighting Zabuza, and he thinks about it and thinks about it when they're following Sasuke who's following Gaara. 

Gaara is half-sand, half-not. Sasuke is on the ground, screaming, with those weird bruises spreading all over him, and Sakura is leaning over him, unable to help. 

"You," Gaara says,"the one I failed to kill..." 

Naruto isn't sensor class. He's terrible at it. But Gaara's chakra is whipping through the air so hard and so thick that even Naruto can tell, and it has the tang of violence to it — killing intent, like Zabuza used, but wild and out of control. Is this, Naruto wonders, what it's like to connect? Is it like feeling someone's intent to murder you, but in reverse? 

Gaara and his killing intent leap at Sasuke. Naruto is too slow. Sakura gets in the way. _Naruto is too slow_. In the split second before Gaara's huge, ugly sand claw hits her she looks as terrified as Naruto feels — and if Naruto were someone else, would Naruto know that they're exactly the same kind of scared? Would they be scared together? It's impossible to know. 

But Sakura is his teammate. One of his precious people. And Sasuke is here, too, and they both _need him_ , so there's nothing Naruto wouldn't do. He fights. He summons Gamabunta. Thirty or so feet up in the air, he flings himself at Gaara so he can beat the guy so hard his lights come back on. Maybe he'll die trying, but certain failure has never stopped Naruto before 

Gaara wakes up before they both land on the forest floor. 

_It has to be exactly the same feeling,_ is what Iruka had always said in his lectures. _So close to your own emotion that it becomes yours, too._

Naruto is making eye contact with Gaara from two or three meters away, but it's like they're right next to each other. Gaara's emotions are just _there_ , and it isn't anger like Naruto would expect. No — it's that crushing sensation, like being so small and knowing that the world is going to make you smaller unless you _do something_ about it. Like you're small and everyone _knows_ and you'll never, ever grow large enough to reach anyone else. 

Naruto feels that. _He_ feels it and it's nothing at all like killing intent, which had been an empty and violent outside force, like a physical enemy in the air around Naruto to be either fought or ignored. There's nothing here to resist; there's just the knowledge that he and Gaara are the same. That Gaara's pain is Naruto's pain, and Naruto will never be unable to feel both ever again. If Naruto concentrates, he can feel Gaara feeling him feeling Gaara — on and on, a repeating pattern hidden inside itself over and over and over again. It's so deep it goes on forever. 

They learn more about each other in a moment of eye contact than they have in the weeks since the Chūnin Exams started. Naruto knows now that Gaara is tired, and Gaara is surprised, and Gaara is _alone_. He starts to drag himself towards Gaara. He's never going to make it, but he has a fight to finish and he _doesn't_ give up and he doesn't know what he's going to do when he gets over there feeling like this but Iruka always said that the first step of _every_ fight is to get close enough to the enemy to do _something_. 

"Naruto," a voice says. It's Sasuke.The bruises are dark, almost black, spreading across his face and his arms and his legs. 

Bruises that Naruto is kind of beginning to suspect _aren't_ bruises. Kakashi is kind of a lying liar, sometimes. 

"That's enough." Sasuke kneels. "Sakura is fine." 

Naruto slumps. He's relieved. He feels relief that Gaara doesn't feel — Gaara probably doesn't even know Sakura's name, let alone care if she's okay — and he _knows_ Gaara doesn't feel it. 

They're not feeling the same way anymore, not even close, but the bond hasn't gone away. 

Maybe that's not so bad. 


End file.
